Both Switzerland and the Nordic Countries have announced their artist selections for the 2026 Venice Biennale (9 May-22 November 2026), the most influential art platform in the world.
Switzerland will be represented by a group of six “cultural practitioners” who will “examine the conditions and possibilities of tolerance and belonging as well as forms of social division”, says a project statement. The five practitioners—Gianmaria Andreetta, Luca Beeler, Nina Wakeford, Miriam Laura Leonardi, Lithic Alliance and Yul Tomatala—were selected through an open call.
Gianmaria Andreetta is a writer and an artist based in The Netherlands, while Nina Wakeford is an artist, sociologist and professor in the Department of Art at Goldsmiths, University of London. Lithic Alliance is an art collective that was founded in 2020 by the artist Daniel V. Keller and Yul Tomatala studied photography at Ecole cantonale d’art de Lausanne. The artist Miriam Laura Leonardi, meanwhile, “explores social codes through an often ironic, self-referential, feminist reading”, says a statement from the Societe Generale financial services group, which nominated the artist for the Swiss emerging artist prize in 2020.
The Swiss exhibition, entitled The Unfinished Business of Living Together, will “explore contemporary forms of coexistence”. The installation is inspired by a 1978 episode of the Swiss television programme Telearena, which featured queer people debating their sexual orientation and place in society with conservative audience members.
Switzerland maintains its own pavilion in the Giardini of the Biennale which has been managed and programmed by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia since 2012.
The Nordic Countries, meanwhile, will be represented by a trio of artists. Czech-born Klara Kristalova draws on Nordic storytelling, creating ceramic sculptures that “evoke rawness, vulnerability, and humanity”, says a statement from Perrotin Gallery, which co-represents her. Finnish-born Benjamin Orlow’s practice encompasses sculpture, video and installation. “His sculptures are often monumental, embodying solitude or the metamorphosis inherent in life’s cyclical nature,” says a biennale statement.
The third artist, Tori Wrånes, describes herself as a “vocalist” with a “transmedial artistic practice”, adding that her “use of sounds, musical instruments, costumes, props, architecture, and sculptures deforms her appearance and creates new rituals and dreamlike constellations”.
“Their work will weave together Nordic mythologies with broader global contexts such as identity, cultural survival and gender equality to bring a compelling and transformative perspective to the Pavilion,” adds the biennale statement. The 2026 presentation will be curated by Anna Mustonen, the chief curator of the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma in Helsinki.
The Nordic Countries exhibition is commissioned by Kiasma in collaboration with Moderna Museet, Sweden, and OCA – Office for Contemporary Art Norway. The project is supported by the Saastamoinen Foundation which funds art and science initiatives. The Nordic pavilion has been shared since 1962 by Norway, Sweden and Finland.
